You Wear Your Praying Mantis Mask

​(You wear your praying mantis mask
And look in the praying mantis’s eye
To see if she will eat you. Do you
Appear to her as gal or guy?

(Asks Lacan.) Alternatively,
The mountain has trees; the air shimmers;
Lavender clings to the slopes; the towns
Below are lined with tzimmers.

How much the silver mine can learn
From men who write or sing or speak
Of silver veins. Lean in to listen
(Don’t be chilled by fits of pique).

When the DNA coiled deep 
Within the cell was sound, it made
A human brain, which when inspired
Rose beyond the barricade.